Beer Smith Question

[Motorbikeman]

 Downloaded it last night .  Having a few small problems when I am planning my recipe. 

Im using a book I used before call Home brew Beers by Greg Hughs http://www.amazon.co.uk/Home-Brew-Beer-Greg-Hughes/dp/1409331768  .  I used this book with a plastic bucket boiler and mashtun  before and did not worry to much hitting the numbers.

I want to refine my methods now as its that time. 

I am having trouble understanding dead space calculations and mash efficiency and instead of guessing I though I might ask. 

When I input the recipe from the book into Beersmith, they are coming up with different results.
  In the book it states:
OG 1060
EFG 1014
Bitterness Rating 55 IBU
Colour Rating 10.6 EBC
This is what Beer Smith says.


I cant find my exact equipment on the drop down menu.     
Its a full size stainless keg boiler and a cheap 32L cooler with a bazooka filter.

   I also dont know the process of working out efficiency  deadspace and how to enter it.      Is this what could be causing the variance between the book and the software?   

I ordered all the ingredients last night to give it a bash in the next few days.

[BrewDorg]

You need to create your own equipment profile first. It might take a few brews to dial in your loss values ie. boil off, trub losses, etc.

These links should help you out.

http://beersmith.com/equipment-setup/

http://brulosophy.com/2014/08/04/beersmith-tutorial-equipment-profile-setup/

[pob]

OG 1060 - matches up

EFG 1014 - is it the exact same yeast?

Bitterness Rating 55 IBU - you may need to check the AA% on your hops (& check against the default in BeerSmith & also on the recipe you have)

Colour Rating 10.6 EBC - change your setting in BeerSmith to use EBC rather than SRM (5.1 SRM ~= 10 EBC, more or less the same)

[Motorbikeman]

Brew this yesterday.  Landed on the beersmith gravity 1.052  pre boil and then 1.060 after the boil. Perfectly.  I think.     

Still not 100% sure what all this means.        Why does boiling it for an hour with hops make the numbers change?


Lost a 2 Liters due to spillage as the keggle tap was useless and I had to tip it into a fermenter with a sieve.

  . Fecking rageing over it as everything was going well until then.     

[Pheeel]

Brew this yesterday.  Landed on the beersmith gravity 1.052  pre boil and then 1.060 after the boil. Perfectly.  I think.     

Still not 100% sure what all this means.        Why does boiling it for an hour with hops make the numbers change?

You're losing liquid so the sugars in the remaining liquid are more concentrated than before the boil

[Motorbikeman]

My OG was 1.060
and after 2 weeks in priamry

My FG  is 1.004

This is a fair bit out  as I was expecting    OG 1.059  and  1.010

My beer is now 7.4%

Not sure why it got so strong as my volumes worked out ok after the boil?   

I did batch sparge 3 times instead of 2 as Beer smith said.    Would that make it stronger in Alc?

[DEMPSEY]

The sparging is all about getting as much sugars out of the grain and that is your 1.060 measurement. The lower finishing gravity is because the yeast was able to consume more of the sugars and so reduce the density of the beer. Remember that 1.000 is the SG of water like how thick it is and when you disolve sugar in it,it gets thicker so 1.004 means you have only 4 parts of sugar remaining. What sort of yeast were you using .

[Motorbikeman]

Used us-05 at 18 degrees.

[DEMPSEY]

Are you sure of the 1.004 measurement 

[Motorbikeman]

I thought I was. 

Just tested the hydrometer in tap water. 

Does not look right to me..



might return it to Tesco. 

[Motorbikeman]

How does one add a stage to batch sparging? 

Im finding I hit my OG number  beter when  to give it a third whirl .. 

Its currently set to 2 stage batch sparge with no apparent setting to change it to 3 with equal amounts of sparge water.

[pob]

Add it here & adjust each stage to show correct water volumes:

[Motorbikeman]

I cant get it to work right its saying:

Error: infusion temp higher than boiling point.     

[molc]

That's because its calculated the water you plan to add will not bring about the desired temperature increase as its higher than 100C. Add more water and reduce your mash in water to work around that.

[pob]

Open Profiles > Mash

Click on and existing mash profile that has multisteps, copy & paste it, rename it.

Click on a stage & rename, e.g. 1st sparge.

Edit or add another stage. e.g. 2nd sparge, with relevent details.